This song was originally written by a guy called Peter Gutteridge. He was one of the founders of the "Dunedin Sound" a musical scene in the south of New Zealand in the early 80s. From there it was covered by "The Clean" one of the early bands of that scene (he had originally been a member of in it's early days, writing a couple of their best early songs). The Dunedin sound, and the Clean became popular on american college radio in the mid to late 80s. I guess Yo La Tengo heard that version.
Great version of a great song,
Yesterday I broke my favorite chair
It cracked as I was sitting there
And on my way to work I fell asleep
That girl reminded me of
Another girl I use to see and
Her ghost continued haunting me all day long
You won’t recognize the sound my engine makes
The balding tires the squeaky brakes
But everybody makes mistakes I guess
That girl reminded me of
Another girl I use to see and
Her ghost continued haunting me all day long
I just want to laugh, but it’s just gonna hurt
Cause I can’t fix what I don’t know I broke
Just laugh and tell another joke
The sticks are woven in the spokes again
Cause I can’t fix what I don’t know I broke
Just laugh and tell another joke
The sticks are woven in the spokes again
I came home to find my neighbors gone
Found my teenage car parked on the lawn
Thought of all the ways that things have changed
So it’s true I never challenged you
Why do you always challenge me
I don’t get paid to sing what everyone is thinking
And I just want to laugh, but it’s just gonna hurt
Cause I can’t fix what I don’t know I broke
Just laugh and tell another joke
The sticks are woven in the spokes again
Cause I can’t fix what I don’t know I broke
Just laugh and tell another joke
The sticks are woven in the spokes again
It cracked as I was sitting there
And on my way to work I fell asleep
That girl reminded me of
Another girl I use to see and
Her ghost continued haunting me all day long
You won’t recognize the sound my engine makes
The balding tires the squeaky brakes
But everybody makes mistakes I guess
That girl reminded me of
Another girl I use to see and
Her ghost continued haunting me all day long
I just want to laugh, but it’s just gonna hurt
Cause I can’t fix what I don’t know I broke
Just laugh and tell another joke
The sticks are woven in the spokes again
Cause I can’t fix what I don’t know I broke
Just laugh and tell another joke
The sticks are woven in the spokes again
I came home to find my neighbors gone
Found my teenage car parked on the lawn
Thought of all the ways that things have changed
So it’s true I never challenged you
Why do you always challenge me
I don’t get paid to sing what everyone is thinking
And I just want to laugh, but it’s just gonna hurt
Cause I can’t fix what I don’t know I broke
Just laugh and tell another joke
The sticks are woven in the spokes again
Cause I can’t fix what I don’t know I broke
Just laugh and tell another joke
The sticks are woven in the spokes again
Lyrics submitted by NotCoolZeus
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This song is about how most guys cant really say what they feel and just shrug it off with a joke. The verses are talking about all the things in his life that are going wrong and the chorus talks about how he cant seem to fix his problems. The image of the sticks woven in the spokes is sort of the idea that he cant fix his problems cause he's almost part of the problem...(?).. i dunno it's still a really good song becuase the idea makes sense i just cant explain it to well.
I think Syross has a very good idea of what this song is about. My opinion is that his day has started off badly (breaking his favorite chair) and things just went downhill. He sings of a bittersweet memory of a girl, which brought him down for the rest of the day.. He sings about wanting to be happy, but laughing hurts because of the pain he's feeling inside.. And he sings of the memories stopping him from moving on... Have you ever tried to ride a bike with sticks and twigs, etc, woven into the spokes? Its kinda hard to get anywhere. And it can also be rather difficult to get them out...
I love this song. I love twothirtyeight...
Coming back to this, seeing as I wrote that almost a year ago... I think many times when life gets you down, the smallest things come to mean so very much. Something like his chair breaking(if that was all) would seem small and not that important... but all these little things just remind him of how much things are changing and how he's getting old. These are re-occuring themes in thier songs... and I love how they capture it.